Urban Planning and Liberal Fascism

Are American urban planners fascists? Conservative writer Jonah Goldberg probably thinks so. In his new book, Liberal Fascism, Goldberg argues that Italian fascists were not right-wing conservatives, but left wingers looking for a semi-socialist alternative to communism. Fascism was based on based on a combination of private means of production with government control over what was produced.

From this view, a lot of what American planning advocates say sounds fascist. In New Geographics of the American West, University of Colorado geographer William Travis expresses a desire for a “strong national role in everything from urban design and architecture to countryside protection.” He believes federal or at least state control of land use is needed in order to impose “discipline” on local development.

Travis also says that “We need to build a roster of standing land use watchdog groups” like 1000 Friends of Oregon. Brownshirts, anyone?

In The Land We Share, Eric Freyfogle says that private property is “an institution that communities reshape over time to promote evolving goals.” This is a nice way of saying, “We get to take away your property rights without compensation any time we want.”

In Suburban Nation, Andres Duany and his co-authors tell government planners that their plans should be “drawn with such precision that only the architectural detail is left to future designers.” Duany repented this view at the first Preserving the American Dream conference in Washington DC. There, he distinguished between “smart growth,” which he defined as government efforts to impose lifestyles on people, and “New Urbanism,” which he defined as developers building for a genuine market that exists for higher density, mixed-use communities. He supports New Urbanism, but many of his colleagues and followers still promote smart-growth government control over land uses.

They can even order cheap cialis order online medications. If any obstruction or blockage comes in any of the mechanism then the whole process gets disturbed. generic 10mg cialis In my next article I can talk about some specific programs I have used and am currently using to ply the trade. cialis generika http://seanamic.com/theres-nothing-like-a-downturn-bob-conners/ You don’t need a prescription for the disease. cheapest sildenafil uk Goldberg’s book raises the specter of the corollary to Godwin’s Law, which says that the first person to invoke Hitler or Nazis in an Internet debate automatically loses. Goldberg skirts this corollary partly because he isn’t writing on the Internet, but mainly because he focuses on fascism, not naziism (though he does include a chapter about Hitler).

With respect to land-use planning, however, any comparison between American planners and fascists is patently unfair. Unfair, that is, to the fascists. In Building New Communities: New Deal America and Fascist Italy, USC architecture historian Diane Ghirardo shows that American planners are far worse than the fascists ever were.

Both Italy and the U.S. built new towns in the 1930s. After they built the towns, says Ghirardo, the fascist government turned the towns over to the residents to use as they saw fit. In contrast, the New Deal planners, led by Rexford Tugwell, maintained strict control over the towns they built.

Residents, even those who were supposedly buying their homes, were not allowed to modify their homes or even the landscaping around them. Government officials retained the right to inspect people’s homes anytime they wanted to make sure that people were not deviating from the government’s plans. Among other things, wives were not allowed to earn a second income outside the homes.

To maximize its control, the government insisted on 40-year mortgages which homebuyers were not allowed to prepay. If anyone did anything in the community that the government did not like, it could and did eject them — causing them to lose any equity they might have earned on their homes.

The rules American planners want to impose today are different but at least as strict. Moreover, they want to impose them on owners in private developments, not just government-built new towns. When it comes to government control, Italian fascists don’t hold a candle to American planners.

Americans all grew up learning that “power corrupts.” So it should be surprising that liberals who believe in freedom and the ACLU are so attracted to giving government more power over individuals. In fact, this impulse to government control is probably universal. As Americans, we should resist this impulse whether it comes from the right or the left.

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About The Antiplanner

The Antiplanner is a forester and economist with more than fifty years of experience critiquing government land-use and transportation plans.

33 Responses to Urban Planning and Liberal Fascism

  1. Dan says:

    When folk in the halls of power and in the halls of academia see letters to the Editor, columns, books, etc with boilerplate ideological phrases such as those liberally sprinkled throughout this post, the lights go off and attention immediately goes elsewhere.

    Why? They see marginal rhetoric. This sort of ideological rhetoric marginalizes itself. It needs no help. This sort of thing gets no play.

    I guess if you’re venting your spleen or practicing blowing your dog whistle, you’re doin’ good. If you’re trying to sway a broader audience beyond the same tiny group of small-minority ideological adherents, you need to put in more hours polishing your message. A lot more hours.

    DS

  2. D4P says:

    “private property is “an institution that communities reshape over time to promote evolving goals.” This is a nice way of saying, “We get to take away your property rights without compensation any time we want.”

    Which is a mean way of saying “Property rights are created by government in the first place.”

    Even the Antiplanner said so recently.

  3. Builder says:

    Dan-

    Could “small-minority ideological adherent” be a boilerplate ideological phrase? Just wondering.

  4. msetty says:

    “In The Land We Share, Eric Freyfogle says that private property is “an institution that communities reshape over time to promote evolving goals.” This is a nice way of saying, “We get to take away your property rights without compensation any time we want.”

    I still am always amazed that libertarians of most stripes seem to have big trouble admitting that all laws are “socially constructed,” including those creating most form of markets and property rights–originating from non-supernatural sources like the U.S. Constitution.

  5. sustainibertarian says:

    Unfair, that is, to the fascists.

    Wow AP, why do you always have to be so neutral about issues? How are you ever going to attract more people if you refuse to make ridiculous analogies to attract people to your cause.

    Travis also says that “We need to build a roster of standing land use watchdog groups” like 1000 Friends of Oregon. Brownshirts, anyone?

    Yes, a group that lobbies government for preserving open space and lower impact development and researches and writes about issues is just like the Brownshirts. Heck all those planning professors must be too!

  6. Unowho says:

    Please, fascism is an ideology. “Smart growth” and “new urbanism” are advertising slogans.

    And Mr. Goldberg should be the last person to castigate anyone as a fascist; he is an enthusiastic supporter of America’s “right” to engage in foreign wars to extend its own interests.

    n.b. The brit-born authoress Taylor Caldwell was the first to draw the connection between post-WWII American (non-classical) liberalism and fascism(her fictional work The Devil’s Advocate was a warning on the subject). She observed that if fascism ever came to the United States, it would come from the left, not the right. I hope that Mr. Goldberg gave her proper credit.

  7. TexanOkie says:

    All of your arguments in this article are against state and federal-level planning. However, an overwhelming majority of planners, despite many of them wanting more federal or state involvement, actually work for local governments, and local governments have a responsibility to their citizens to ensure wise use and investment of public taxes. Hence local planning and what most planners actually do for a living. I’ll reiterate again the desire to see the Antiplanner tackle the issue of American Federalism all the way down to local jurisdiction, because I am local planner and do not want my state government, but especially the federal government, telling me how to do my job when he does not know anything about my community. And thus far, aside from giving me the basic regulatory authority to do my job, my state and federal government have not micromanaged my community’s efforts to wisely invest in and provide means to sustain their future.

  8. Francis King says:

    Of all the posts that Antiplanner has done so far, some very thought provoking, some less so, this must be the most bizarre. Perhaps in the wilderness of US politics, a planner telling another citizen that they cannot build a house on this or that piece of land is considered to be fascism. Europeans have had a much more up-front and in-their-face view of fascism, and know the difference. If the planning inspector turns up with his colleague from the Gestaats Polizei, then maybe there’s an argument. Is this likely to happen in the USA?

    A book which links Mussolini and Hillary Clinton is one can short of a six-pack. And, I’m no fan of Hillary Clinton. What is it with people going after her?

  9. Ettinger says:

    Right off the press at today’s Yahoo news.

    “…A government report Tuesday said U.S. home prices posted their first annual decline in 16 years…the 10-city index also set a record annual decline of 9.8 percent in December, while the 20-city index dropped 9.1 percent….Only three metro areas — Charlotte, N.C., Portland, Ore., and Seattle — showed year-over-year increases in prices,…”

    Two of the cities I know are champions of smart growth. Not sure about Charlotte.

    Is this the smart growth premium?

  10. Ettinger says:

    “…a planner telling another citizen that they cannot build a house on this or that piece of land is considered to be fascism.”

    Yes, exactly. A social system where a government representative can at will change your life plan overnight is a totalitarian regime. That holds true even if the official is elected by majoritarian rule.

  11. D4P says:

    Geez: people must really like living in Charlotte, Portland, and Seattle.

  12. Ettinger says:

    Yes, of those places where people like to live in, those that impose growth restrictions experience housing price infaltion. There are many desirable places in the US.

  13. Dan says:

    It is well-known and understood that so-called ‘Smart Growth’ communities/areas/districts retain their value better than typical auto-dependent suburbia.

    94.5% of the population of this country thinks this is a good thing, as their major investment is property and they want a positive return.

    Charlotte is attempting to cure some of its ills with Smart Growth, but it does nominal growth management (my statement: eh.).

    DS

  14. D4P says:

    I wonder: if “smart growth” communities suddenly eliminated any and all land use regulations, would property owners sue the local government for any resulting decrease in their property values? I’m sure at least some of them would try it.

  15. Ettinger says:

    In view of the fact that people seem to fall for planning, the best personal strategy is to:

    a) You buy a house in a desirable and affordable area and then you try to close the door behind you. That is,

    b) under the ideoligical framework of preserving quality of life and character of the region, you start campaining for growth restrictions.

    c) The growth restrictions cause shortage of housing and the value of your home goes up.

    d) Once the inflated prices become enough of a disincentive that the region stops growing, you sell your home, you move into another desirable and affordable area and you start the process all over again.

    You can do that on a small scale, or you can do it on a large scale, by being a developer. Popular wisdom has it that it is developers who are mostly against planning. Not so. They are the ones that benefit most financially from planning. The fact is that only developers with connections to city hall can get anything built. They bear the cost of the lengthy process of getting the “right” planners elected to office and then pass on the cost to you, the consumer.

  16. Ettinger says:

    You always buy up, that is, more expensive. So, as long as you stay in the same area, when home prices go up, you loose. In most cases you also loose even if you move, because the people who got there before you did, have long since started working on their smart growth. Because they feel compelled to protect the character of their region against you, the newcomer.

  17. D4P says:

    I think Ettinger needs to distinguish between the people he’s talking about (i.e. relatively wealthy homeowners who don’t want to let anyone else in) and environmentalists who actually care about preserving “nature” for reasons beyond their own property value and notions of “quality of life”. The two groups are not mutually exclusive, but they are nevertheless two different groups. It so happens that their objectives overlap in at least some cases, but dismissing the first group doesn’t address the concerns of the second.

  18. Unowho says:

    “Two of the cities I know are champions of smart growth. Not sure about Charlotte.

    Is this the smart growth premium?

    Using the C-S data, both Seattle & Portland median prices peaked in August of 2007. As in the past, effects of a recession and a deflating housing bubble will be felt last in the geographic concentrations of wealth. Those two cities are just about a year behind the curve.

    Charlotte should do relatively well; NC will probably continue to be a popular destination for escapees from the northeast.

    BTW, you can compare residential RE price changes in up to three MSAs through the “Quarterly House Price Indexes” from the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight.

  19. Dan says:

    One thing to consider is that growth management areas actively attempt to dampen the oscillations of the business cycle; that is: the negative slope is neither as steep nor as protracted. I can tell you on the Front Range we’re going steeply negative, and it’s cowboy here, little management.

    DS

  20. D4P says:

    Is it at least a little ironic that people are criticizing “smart growth” communities for not losing housing values when other communities are?

    It’s as if we’re supposed to believe that these critics would be singing smart growth’s praises if housing prices in smart growth communities were currently declining more rapidly than in non-smart growth communities.

  21. Ettinger says:

    “The two groups…”

    No matter what the motivation is, the result is the same. Higher home prices and life under the Damocles sword of government regulation, whereby maintaining your dreams from day to day depends on the whim of the public.

    But let me cut through the chase and give you a personal account to illustrate how things work in practice:

    I work in cancer research. I’m actually about to achieve a major milestone in my research. My main motivation for the long work that brings me to this point is, yes, the American Dream. “I give you a therapy that may cure an extra 10,000 people and you allow me the American Dream”. That is my contract with the public.

    If the public is not willing to honor that contract and tries to regulate that dream out of my reach then all bets are off. The public can then cure their own cancers. It would not be worth it to me to do the work that I do. There is not any other compensation that I value nearly as much as the American dream.

    Those who think that I’m bluffing should visit Europe (the continent I come from). There, you will find many, very capable people, who have little motivation to do anything productive. Because it is just not worth it. Their societies are heavily regulated and dreaming is very difficult. This is how I behaved too when I lived in Europe. Coming to America enabled me to take flight and the American dream motivated me to do so. That’s why they call it the American Dream. Because it is only possible in the less regulated America.

    My suggestion is that those of you who like the regulatory state should actually move to Europe. You may actually take my place there, I’ll trade you citizenships. Why go through the enormous effort to reshape America when it is all there ready for you in Europe; regulation, sustainable living, high density and all.

    It is also a matter of cultural diversity. Why do you want to render extinct the American way of life, the only society that still believes in personal freedom ? An endangered species indeed.

  22. D4P says:

    Why do you want to render extinct the American way of life

    Why do you want to render extinct the lives of other organisms?

  23. Dan says:

    My suggestion is that those of you who like the regulatory state should actually move to Europe.

    Wow. 295 million people moving at once to Yurp, SUVs and all. Shocking to that culture, surely.

    See, people like th’ regalayshuns pertektin’ their property values. Sorry to keep bursting your little bubbles around here, but that’s the way it is. That’s what Glaeser – whom Randal likes so much – keeps complaining about. Residents pressuring local electeds to zone to pertekt their property values.

    Ah, well. Back to fantasyland with you, E.

    DS

  24. prk166 says:

    “and local governments have a responsibility to their citizens to ensure wise use and investment of public taxes.”

    Since when were local governments an investment vehicle? Sheeeeet, I wonder if they’ve looked at investing the Qs lately instead of using my money to subsidize more condos.

  25. Ettinger says:

    “Europeans have had a much more up-front and in-their-face view of fascism, and know the difference.”

    Since Europe is the continent I come from, please allow me,

    Collectivism, the driving ideology behind totalitarianism, left or right, never really left Europe. There was a backlash against totalitarianism right after WWII, when the devastating effects of the subjugation of individuals to a greater national cause were so fresh in memory. But by the 1960s, Europe had to a large extent slipped back into collectivism, socialist this time. There was a 2nd backlash in the 1980s when it became so blatanty apparent that collectivist societies were falling so far behind societies that respected individual freedom. Lately, with the fall of the Berlin wall and the ills of collectivism fading away, Europe is once again slipping into, Brussels driven this time, collectivism.

    There is a fallacy amongst Americans that totalitarianism in Europe was imposed on the will of the people. Not so. People invite totalitarianism. Although fascism, nazism and communism did not follow the formal democratic process in their ascent to power, they did nonetheless ascend to power with the support of the people, or at least a majority of the people, pity on the others.

    The ills of collectivism are only apparent in hindsight. When the totalitarian regimes of Europe came to power, they did so with good intentions and a benevolent face. I’m afraid that the new face of totalitarianism is green. And as the European (and indedd worldwide) experience shows, once collectivism takes hold, it is very difficult to reverse it. Especially when there’s no society left to demonstrate the superiority of the alternative.

  26. Ettinger says:

    “Wow. 295 million people moving at once to Yurp, SUVs and all. Shocking to that culture, surely. “

    I did not mean all 295 million…, just those that worship the European model. Unless, of course, they promote the European model in blogs and then drive SUVs

  27. Dan says:

    Is it at least a little ironic that people are criticizing “smart growth” communities for not losing housing values when other communities are?

    And calling market choices ‘collectivist’.

    Not a good sign for the argument against. It’s as if they have nothing. No argument, no cogency, nada. Jus’ makin’ stuff up.

    DS

  28. Pingback: Piedmont Publius » Blog Archive » Definition of Liberal Fascism expanded

  29. Unowho says:

    From Ettinger (no. 15):
    “Popular wisdom has it that it is developers who are mostly against planning. Not so. They are the ones that benefit most financially from planning. The fact is that only developers with connections to city hall can get anything built.”

    That’s a variation of “regulatory capture” as elegantly described by
    Robert Bruegmann

    If you wish to see it action, Google Forest City Enterprises–in particular, “Forest City Stapleton” or “Ratner Atlantic Yards.” The campaign contribution trail from the various principals of FCE is illuminating.

    FCE and the like are masters of obtaining tax abatements, transit subsidies, and eminent domain takings in order to mazimimize profit while minimizing risk. Too bad they don’t teach this stuff in schools.

  30. rotten says:

    Comparing “smart growth” to fascism is extreme, wrong, and ultimately damaging to the “cause”. It’s the left and greens who are supposed to make these histrionic and idiotic comparisons, not libertarians. 😉

  31. bennett says:

    rotten said:
    “Comparing “smart growth” to fascism is extreme, wrong, and ultimately damaging to the “cause”. It’s the left and greens who are supposed to make these histrionic and idiotic comparisons, not libertarians.”

    The next post down has libertarians comparing land use regulations to murder! You need to get a hold of you so called “cause.”

  32. Francis King says:

    Ettinger said:

    “Collectivism, the driving ideology behind totalitarianism, left or right, never really left Europe. There was a backlash against totalitarianism right after WWII, when the devastating effects of the subjugation of individuals to a greater national cause were so fresh in memory. But by the 1960s, Europe had to a large extent slipped back into collectivism, socialist this time. There was a 2nd backlash in the 1980s when it became so blatanty apparent that collectivist societies were falling so far behind societies that respected individual freedom. Lately, with the fall of the Berlin wall and the ills of collectivism fading away, Europe is once again slipping into, Brussels driven this time, collectivism.”

    Socialism is not totalitarian. All of the socialist European countries are full democracies. I don’t know how anyone could call the EU totalitarian or collectivist. The EU is based on the principle of subsidiarity, that is, the individual member states control their own affairs, including running their own system of government (republican or monarchical). The EU has its own currency, of which the UK is not a member. It’s worth comparing this with the USA, which is federal, republican, and a with a universal single currency. The EU has all the strengths, and all the weaknesses, of a confederacy.

    “There is a fallacy amongst Americans that totalitarianism in Europe was imposed on the will of the people. Not so. People invite totalitarianism. Although fascism, nazism and communism did not follow the formal democratic process in their ascent to power, they did nonetheless ascend to power with the support of the people, or at least a majority of the people, pity on the others.”

    The Soviet and Fascist governments came to power on the back of revolutions. Adolf Hitler was made leader of Germany under the democratic system of the Weimar Republic.

    “The ills of collectivism are only apparent in hindsight. When the totalitarian regimes of Europe came to power, they did so with good intentions and a benevolent face. I’m afraid that the new face of totalitarianism is green. And as the European (and indedd worldwide) experience shows, once collectivism takes hold, it is very difficult to reverse it. Especially when there’s no society left to demonstrate the superiority of the alternative.”

    Most of the environmentalists are young and naive. I still remember being that young (just about).

  33. the highwayman says:

    The book’s cover reminded me of Wal-Mart’s logo, which is kind of ironic given the nature of this blog is about promoting Liberalism and corporate-statism.

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